Proposal of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment: Introduction and Committee Action

prev | next

Section 1:

The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

Section 2:

The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

By the late 1960s, a large bipartisan movement supported lowering the voting age in all elections to 18.1 This broad, nationwide coalition included young persons, students, teachers, civil rights groups, religious groups, and labor unions.2 Supporters of lowering the voting age petitioned Congress, lobbied state legislatures and the public, pursued litigation in the courts, and held conferences and rallies.3 In the midst of campus protests against the Vietnam War, some Members of Congress and other officials argued that giving young people the vote would allow them to express their views peacefully within the political process.4

On January 25, 1971, Senator Jennings Randolph introduced S.J. Res. 7, a proposed constitutional amendment to lower the voting age to 18, in the 92nd Congress.5 Less than two months after it was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee,6 the committee reported the joint resolution favorably.7 The committee explained that the draft Twenty-Sixth Amendment was modeled after the Fifteenth Amendment, which prohibits racial discrimination in voting, and the Nineteenth Amendment, which recognizes women’s suffrage and prohibits sex discrimination in voting.8 The committee explained that the amendment would prohibit age-based discrimination against citizens 18 years of age or older in all federal, state, and local elections.9 In the committee’s view, the draft amendment would also prohibit imposing “special burdens” on these young voters, such as compelling them to vote by absentee ballot or in “one centralized location,” which the committee believed would be inconsistent with the purposes of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause and the Voting Rights Act.10

Observing that the proposed amendment had attained broad bipartisan support, the committee explained why the Constitution should be amended to lower the voting age to 18.11 First, many Americans believed that 18- to 20-year-olds possessed the maturity and knowledge needed to vote.12 Second, by age 18, millions of young Americans were legally responsible for their actions and had assumed citizenship responsibilities like raising families, paying taxes, or serving in the Armed Forces.13 Finally, many proponents of lowering the voting age argued that it would help to bring youthful “idealism” and “energies” into the political process and “give young people the real opportunity to influence [American] society in a peaceful and constructive manner.” 14

Turning to practical considerations, the committee observed that the proposed amendment would resolve administrative difficulties resulting from the Supreme Court’s decision in Oregon v. Mitchell, which held that Congress could lower the voting age in federal elections but not any other elections.15 The amendment would thus alleviate the danger of “confusion,” “delay,” and “fraud” from states’ maintenance of two separate elections systems.16 The committee also observed that the proposed amendment would allow young adult citizens in all of the states to vote in state and local elections and thereby express their views on matters particularly relevant to their lives, such as education.17

On January 29, 1971, Representative Emanuel Celler, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, introduced a nearly identical joint resolution, H.J. Res. 223, in the House of Representatives.18 It was referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary,19 and in March, the committee reported the joint resolution favorably.20 In explaining its support for the joint resolution, the committee cited many of the arguments contained in the Senate Judiciary Committee’s report on S.J. Res. 7, including concerns about states maintaining “dual-age” voting systems and the need for a constitutional amendment to prevent Congress or state legislatures from raising the minimum voting age in the future.21 Referring to the proposed amendment as “part of a constitutional tradition of enlarging participation in [the nation’s] political processes,” the House report stated that the Amendment would give citizens 18 to 20 years of age the right to vote and, more broadly, participate “in the political process, free of discrimination on account of age.” 22

1: Alison Ge, The Twenty-Sixth Amendment and Protecting the Youth Vote, 25 N.Y.U. J. Legis. & Pub. Pol’y 167, 174–75 (2022). See also , and Oregon v. Mitchell (discussing the Voting Rights Act Amendments of 1970 and the Supreme Court’s decision in Oregon v. Mitchell, 400 U.S. 112 (1970)).
2: Id. at 174–75. For more on the role that this movement played in laying the groundwork for the Twenty-Sixth Amendment, see Jennifer Frost, “Let Us Vote!” : Youth Voting Rights and the 26th Amendment (2021).
3: Frost, supra note 2, at 192–212.
4: Ge, supra note 1, at 174–75. (citing testimony in congressional hearings); see also Nat’l Comm’n on the Causes and Prevention of Violence, Final Report on the Causes and Prevention of Violence 225 (1969). During the 1968 presidential election, both major political party platforms supported lowering the voting age to 18, but the Republican Party’s platform contended that states should take the lead on the issue rather than Congress. 1968 Democratic Party Platform (Aug. 26, 1968), Am. Presidency Project, >https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/1968-democratic-party-platform (supporting an amendment to the Constitution lowering the minimum voting age to 18); Republican Party Platform of 1968 (Aug. 5, 1968), Am. Presidency Project, >https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/republican-party-platform-1968 (encouraging states to consider lowering the minimum voting age to 18).
5: 117 Cong. Rec. 363 (1971). Senator Randolph had introduced nearly identical proposed amendments in earlier Congresses, including when he served as a House Member in the 1940s. See S. Rep. No. 92-26, at 2 (1971). In the years leading up to Congress’s proposal of the Twenty-Sixth Amendment, the Senate Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Constitutional Amendments held several hearings on lowering the voting age. See, e.g., Lowering the Voting Age to 18: Hearings Before the Subcomm. on Constitutional Amendments of the S. Comm. on the Judiciary, 91st Cong. 1 (1970); Lowering the Voting Age to 18: Hearings Before Subcomm. on Constitutional Amendments of the S. Comm. on the Judiciary, 90th Cong. 1 (1968).
6: See 117 Cong. Rec. 364 (1971).
7: S. Rep. No. 92-26, at 1 (1971). The committee reported the joint resolution with technical amendments adopted by its Subcommittee on Constitutional Amendments that conformed the formatting and language of the joint resolution’s preamble to prior ratified amendments. See id.
8: Id. at 2. Accord 117 Cong. Rec. 7534 (1971) (statement of Rep. Poff); id. at 7539 (statement of Rep. Pepper).
9: S. Rep. No. 92-26, at 2 (1971).
10: Id. at 14.
11: Id. at 5–6.
12: Id. at 6.
13: Id. at 6–7.
14: Id.
15: See id. at 12.
16: Id. The committee also observed that there were significant questions about whether 18- to 20-year-olds could vote in elections for state delegates who would nominate candidates to both federal and state offices. See id. at 17.
17: Id. at 12.
18: 117 Cong. Rec. 1047 (1971).
19: Id.
20: H.R. Rep. No. 92-37, at 1 (1971).
21: Id. at 5–8. The committee also observed that, absent an amendment to the federal Constitution, many states would need to amend their constitutions to lower the voting age, which would likely be impossible before the 1972 elections. However, state legislatures could likely ratify the proposed Twenty-Sixth Amendment before these elections. Id. at 7.
22: Id. at 7–9 (expressing the view that the proposed amendment would encompass the “entire political selection process,” including “all action necessary to make a vote effective in any primary, special, or general election” but was not intended to alter age qualifications for public office).